


Your Own Personal Jesus

by angelica_church_schuyler



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 80s Music, Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, First Love, M/M, Religious Guilt, Slow Burn, religious homophobia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-07-23 13:14:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20008861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelica_church_schuyler/pseuds/angelica_church_schuyler
Summary: At a strict Catholic high school, the priest's kid and the weird loner kid are forced to work together on a history project, which leads to becoming reluctant friends. Reluctant friends who spend all their time together and care about each other deeply but definitely don't like each other.Okay, maybe a little bit.





	Your Own Personal Jesus

**Author's Note:**

> A quick note: Aziraphale is not a human name, which is why I'm not using it. I don't remember if the name 'Ezra Fell' has any ties to canon or if I just read it in a different fic and it got embedded in my brain or something but that's the name I've gone with for Aziraphale in this story. Crowley, Anathema, Gabriel, etc. all have the same names. 
> 
> shoutout to my queen grasslandgirl for being my beta thank you ily <3

“You really didn’t have to drive me,” Ezra said.

His father had insisted on driving him to school this year, despite the fact that the term was already halfway over and the school was only a ten-minute walk away. It was so close that when he was very small and would climb up to the very top of the highest tree in their backyard, he could see the huge, stark white exterior of the school chapel. If he squinted, he could even make out the tiny shapes of students, nuns, and priests alike, wandering in and out of the presence of God.

He would lose sight of it when his brother would come along and shake the branch he was standing on, watching and laughing as he crashed back to earth.

His father smiled at him awkwardly. “It’s cold out there, you know. And I’m going to school too, it’s not exactly an inconvenience. And I thought it might be some nice bonding time. Father to son.”  
Ezra stared out of the window, watching the city go by. “It’s a five-minute drive, Dad.”  
“Better than nothing at all.”  
“You never drive Gabriel.”  
“Gabriel talks to me.”

Ezra had to admit that that was partially true. His older, more awful brother went from whatever sporting rehearsal he had after school straight home to sit and eat dinner and talk about whatever boring things they’d gotten up to that day. Ezra, on the other hand, preferred to go to his aunt’s bookshop. He’d spend the afternoon curled up on one of her many antique armchairs with a book or his homework, only interrupted by conversations with Aunt Tracy or the occasional customer.  
But Ezra spent time with his father, too.  
“I help you after church. I spend practically all Sunday with you.”  
“One day a week, Ezra,” his father sighed. “That’s barely anything.”  
“Better than nothing at all.”  
It felt like more than one day a week. Church was a strange place for him. It used to feel welcoming and warm, but in recent years it had started to almost burn. It was supposed to be a place where one would feel the overwhelming love of God and your fellow man. Recently, he’d only felt silence and judgement. No one had ever said anything, but he was pretty sure that all of them, except for his father, had picked up on the fact that he was as gay as a bloody daffodil before he had. Maybe he would have coped with their judgement better if he still felt God there.  
If he were being completely honest with himself, part of him hating spending time with his father. They had never been as close as his father and Gabriel were. And he was a priest, for goodness sake. Every time his father looked at him Ezra felt like he was being looked straight through, like all of his deepest, darkest thoughts and secrets and sins were being laid bare for his father and his brother and God to see and he was being Judged- not just judged but Judged, with a capital J. It felt like being Damned. With a capital D.

The five-minute car ride somehow stretched into an eternity. Even with the radio turned up he couldn’t drown out his nerves. In fact, the obnoxious radio hosts might have been making it worse. The hosts on the Christian radio station made him want to put his head through the car window, but his father didn’t like them listening to too much secular music, so he simply had to put up with the overly chipper idiots and the repetitive, boring Christian rock. 

His father spoke up again as they got within a mile of the school.  
“Would you like me to just drop you off here?”  
“No, it’s fine,” Ezra sighed. His father always worried that the boys were embarrassed by him. They weren’t, but good luck getting him to believe that. 

Ezra finally managed to shake his father off as they entered the school, waving goodbye as he headed towards the common room and his father headed towards the staff room. Hopefully, if neither of their routes had changed and they could manage to avoid each other, they wouldn’t see each other for a good twelve hours. 

He quite liked school, which he recognised was an unpopular opinion among his peers, but he couldn’t help it. It wasn’t that he found it fun, and he hated homework and revision and tests as much as anyone else, but he liked learning. He liked most of the people he went to school with, and he liked his teachers and the chaplains well enough. Most of the nuns were terrifying, but what nun wasn't?

He didn’t enjoy morning prayers, especially when they were led by his father, which was often. There were so many other priests in this school and yet it always ended up being his father.  
_“Our father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name…”_  
He could feel his father glancing at him. He was probably trying to hide it, just taking a quick look every now and then, making sure his son’s head was bowed, eyes closed, hands clasped together, like he’d been taught his whole life.  
_“Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven…”_  
He could feel the suffocating eyes of the statue of the Virgin Mary, the eyes of a stained-glass Jesus scanning the room, searching for the guilty and the soon-to-be damned.  
_Lord, I don’t know if you hear me, he thought, beginning the same prayer he repeated every day. I know it’s wrong to even doubt that You hear me, but I do doubt it, and I hope you can forgive me. I hope you can hear me. I really hope you still love me._

His father’s voice continued to reverberate off the cold stone walls.

_God, I need you to please help me. You know I need you, You know what I need You to do, and I need You to do it. I’m begging you. I repent for all my sins, I’ll do anything just please help me be better._

_”For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory. Forever and ever, amen.”_

_Amen._

* * *

As much as he loved his classes, he had a tendency to be late to them. It was, partially, because he took alternate routes to many classes in order to avoid his father and brother, but also because he got lost and distracted easily. Ironically, today this had ended up with him bumping into his brother. Literally.  
Gabriel was far taller than Ezra, and more intimidating in every single way. Bigger, stronger, older, smarter, _better._ And he never let his little brother forget it.

“What the hell are you doing? Shouldn’t you be in class?”  
Ezra rubbed the spot on his head that had collided with his brother’s elbow. “Shouldn’t you?”  
“Nah, I’ve got other stuff to do.”  
“Like what?”  
“Like _none of your business,_ dimwit. Go to class.”  
He hated to admit that Gabriel was right, but he was technically supposed to have been in class seven minutes ago. “Whatever. If I find out you’re doing something...something...i-illegal or something, I’ll tell Dad.”  
Gabriel snickered. “No, you won’t.”  
No, he wouldn’t.  
But he _would_ be in a world of trouble if he didn’t leave immediately. “See you tonight, then.”  
“See you, idiot.”

* * *

Ezra supposed he was a bit of a loner. He didn’t really have anyone that he’d call a friend at school, or anywhere else for that matter. The cat that lived in his aunt’s bookshop didn’t count, apparently.

He supposed he had Newt and Anathema.  
They were technically in the year below him, but by some miracle of some saint of scholars they’d ended up taking advanced classes. Lord only knew why out of everything they could’ve done they’d chosen to take _History of Religion,_ considering that they both hated history and he was fairly sure neither of them were even religious.  
“Newt wanted to take that computer class but every electronic he touches turns to dust,” Anathema had explained.  
“That is not true!” argued Newt. “They just...they, sort of...turn into...fire.”  
“Yeah, that’s so much better.”  
He didn’t see them outside of school. He thought they probably saw each other a lot. They seemed like they’d been friends for quite some time, and he was fairly sure Newt was in love with her. She didn’t seem to notice, and come to think of it neither did Newt. He was curious to see how long _that_ lasted.

Newt stared at Anathema adoringly as she told yet another story about her extremely weird little brother, Andrew or Adam or something, while their teacher droned on about indulgences.  
Ezra was fairly sure he’d heard this particular Adam story before, and if he had then Newt _definitely_ had, and yet Newt was giving the story (and the girl) his full attention. It was common knowledge that Newt was obsessed with her, but Ezra thought that he might have been the first person to realise that Anathema felt the same way. Newt had no idea, and he felt that maybe Anathema didn’t either, but to him it was almost too obvious. It made being around the two of them unnecessarily frustrating.

A thunderous _thwack_ echoed around the classroom (and probably around the entire United Kingdom), followed by the sort of booming voice that can only be achieved by a nun armed with the power of God and a metre long ruler.  
“Miss Device, if you would care to pay attention please!”  
“Yes, sister. Sorry, sister.”

Sister Agnes was the only person Ezra had ever seen Anathema afraid of. Even the other teachers couldn’t phase her. He theorised that it was the combination of the nun’s voice, stature, and eyes. Quite frankly, the eyes made her look like she was always on the verge of going completely bonkers, as if she were standing on a cliff and the tiniest wind would push her over the edge and into the waters of pure insanity. This had earned her the nickname ‘Sister Nutter’, but no one would dare speak it on school grounds. She had a habit of jumping out of the shadows whenever you least expected it.

“And while we’re at it,” said Sister Agnes. “Mr Crowley, for the last time, if you wouldn’t mind taking off those glasses!”  
Crowley, a boy with light reddish-brown hair who wore dark sunglasses whenever possible, stared up at the nun. Ezra couldn’t tell behind his glasses, but it almost seemed like he was rolling his eyes. “I’ve told you, sister, I need them to see.”  
“I very much doubt that. Take them off!”  
Crowley mumbled something that Ezra supposed wasn’t particularly nice, but took off his glasses anyway. Not even the bravest, stupidest person would risk incurring the wrath of a nun.

Ezra had noticed Crowley. Quite a lot, actually. He didn’t seem to have any friends either. He was also sometimes late to class, always with some increasingly ridiculous excuse prepared. He talked back to teachers and slumped and slouched and once he’d winked in Ezra’s direction and Ezra had almost spontaneously combusted.  
Ezra had been trying not to notice him anymore.

Now that the whole class was paying attention and suitably terrified, Sister Agnes decided to continue with her lesson.  
“Your first assignment will be done in groups of two.” Which meant Newt and Anathema would pair up together and leave him to work with some random he’d never spoken to before who wouldn’t do any work and would reap the rewards of Ezra’s hard work. Lovely.  
“You will pick one of five topics relating to the Protestant Reformation, OR choose an important figure in the Reformation, and you will create a poster - a _simple_ poster, please, I don’t want to be reading your inane nonsense for too long and colours give me a headache - about the topic.”

Newt slowly raised his shaking hand.  
“You have a question, Pulsifer?”  
“Um, yes, sister.”  
“Go ahead, then. It better not be stupid.”  
“Um, will, um, can we-will we be choosing our own partners, or um, or will, will you?”  
Sister Agnes sighed. “I told you not to ask a stupid question and yet you did it anyway. Teenagers. Yes, Mr Pulsifer, you may choose your own partner.”  
Newt and Anathema immediately turned to each other. “Be my partner?” they cried in disgusting unison.  
The class began to babble, asking their immediate neighbours to be their partners and running to the other side of the room when they were rejected. Ezra stayed in his seat, waiting to be one of two students left over when all of the people with friends had paired up.

Sister Agnes ignored the students in favour of writing the five available topics on the board.

_
  * How did the invention of the Gutenberg printing press influence the events of the Protestant Reformation?
  * How did the Reformation occur in or influence European countries outside of England?
_
  * _What was the role of women in the Reformation?_ (Ezra had a feeling Anathema would pick that one.)
  * _What role did political and social factors play in the Reformation?_
  * _Who was Martin Luther and what were his 95 theses?_



The chatter began to die down and Sister Agnes wrote down the pairings. He watched and ticked off students in his head, trying to figure out who he would end up paired with.  
The list of potential partners grew smaller and smaller (how the hell had _Bradman_ gotten a partner but he hadn’t?) until, finally, predictably, inevitably -  
“Fell, Crowley, neither of you have partners?”  
Ezra couldn’t help but scowl a little. “No, Sister.”  
“Nope,” echoed Crowley.  
“Well, you’ll have to work together then.”  
Crowley turned around to look at him. He gave him a small wave, which Ezra returned half-heartedly. 

The bell rang out at that very moment, saving Ezra the awkwardness of having to actually interact with his new partner.  
“Oh, thank Christ,” breathed Sister Agnes. “Assignment is due in three weeks, now get out of here, I want to go home.”

* * *

Ezra managed to evade his father on the way home. He had an after school routine, and he’d be damned if his dad’s sudden obsession with father-son bonding was going to ruin it.  
The twenty minute walk from school to his aunt’s bookshop was the most walking Ezra was willing to do. He’d leave school as soon as possible, 3:30 at the very latest, walking as fast as he could to the bakery on the end of the street, where he’d buy as many croissants and donuts and buns as he could afford (there was food at the bookshop, but eating it was a very, very bad idea).  
He’d arrive at the bookshop by 4 o’clock at the latest and stay there as long as he could. Some nights his father would call around 6 or 7, insisting that he come home. But some nights, the best nights, he’d stay there until 9 or 10.  
He didn’t really _do_ much. There was a very old armchair near the back of the shop. It was a horrible shade of brown that Ezra thought might have been red once, some time in the Georgian era. Cotton was bursting out of ripped seams, and the cat that lived in the shop had scratched its arms and legs to hell. But it was his, sort of. No one else ever sat there, probably because it looked so awful. He’d sit there, reading every book he could find (although he never bought them; the books were unreasonably expensive and his aunt did not offer a family discount), or occasionally doing homework or studying. There would be no interruptions, no father or brother to annoy him. Occasionally there would be a customer who needed help and assumed he knew his way around (the bookshop did not have a conventional organisational system, and he and Tracy were the only ones capable of navigating the place; he’d try and help them find whatever it was they needed, but more often than not he’d have to get Tracy’s help), or his aunt might strike up a short conversation or bring him some tea (the food was not to be accepted under any circumstances, but tea was alright).  
There was always music playing, and it was always new wave, and he’d never asked why.  
It was the most peaceful place on earth.

Today, Ezra realised upon entering the shop, must be Supply Day. Supply Days were the worst days of the month, in his opinion. Boxes full of new books, random stationery, receipt paper, and God knows what else crowded the shop, hiding his aunt from view momentarily.

A brightly coloured blur jumped out from behind a pile of boxes. “Oh, hello, darling. Forgot you were coming, how silly of me. The place is a bit of a mess, I’m afraid.”  
Ezra smiled. “How’s Supply Day?”  
“Same as always, I s’pose. Bit busy, bit crowded, bit overwhelming. Don’t worry, though, I’ve made sure your chairs free.”  
“Do you need any help?”  
“No, no, I’m perfectly alright. You go sit down, I’ll put the kettle on. I could use a break…”  
Tracy shuffled off to the bookshop’s backroom. Ezra had never been there, and considering how secretive Aunt Tracy was about it, he never wanted to.  
He sank into his armchair and pulled out a book. Depeche Mode were singing something about strange love. The Cat hissed at a box.  
“What are you doing?” Ezra questioned.  
The Cat didn’t answer.

Contrary to popular opinion, The Cat did not belong to his aunt. The Cat did not belong to anyone. It was its own entity, answering to nothing and no one. The theory was that he was a stray who had somehow managed to find his way into a bookshop that supplied warmth, pats, and the occasional bit of food, and he’d decided not to leave. Ezra thought it was a well-thought out and very wise decision.

Tracy came back in and handed him a mug so hot it burned his hand before scurrying back towards the towers of boxes. From where he was sitting they almost looked like a city skyline.  
He sometimes wondered how Tracy could possibly be his father’s sister. Her bright red hair and soft, motherly smile were the antithesis of his father’s dark features and stern eyes (he was fairly certain she died her hair, but the point still stood). She didn’t force conversation the way his father did. She didn’t judge or condemn anyone. Everyone who walked into that bookshop was treated exactly the same, with the same big smile and joyous attitude, no matter who they were. 

Tracy’s voice carried across the bookshop from behind the cardboard skyscrapers. “Anything interesting happen at school?”  
“No, not really,” he answered. He poked the mug with his little finger, checking to see if it was still too hot. It definitely was. He could only imagine that Aunt Tracy filled her kettle with hellfire. “Well...I mean, it’s not particularly _interesting,_ but I got paired up with this kid I’ve barely talked to for a project on the Protestant Reformation.”  
“Oh, I’ve got plenty on the books on the Reformation! I’m...well, I have no clue where they are, to be honest, but I’ll find them.”  
“Thanks.”  
“This boy, is he nice?”  
“I don’t know. Like I said, I barely know him. But I get the feeling I’ll be shouldering most of the work.”  
She hummed her disapproval while picking up a box almost as big as she was. “I know the feeling. Do you remember that fellow I hired a few years ago to help out, Shadwell?”  
“Vaguely, yes.” Tracy looked like she was about to crumble under the box’s weight. “Are you sure you don’t need help?”  
“No, I’m alright. Useless man. Most men are useless. No offence, love. Anyway, he barely did anything. I had to let him go. I think he was not quite all there. Very into conspiracy theories.”  
“There’s a girl in my class like that. She’s lovely, though. Definitely not useless.”  
“Well, of course she’s not. But I very much doubt she was as insane as Shadwell. Is she insane?”  
“No.”  
“Shadwell was bonkers. I wonder what he’s up to nowadays.”  
Aunt Tracy looked up, staring at the window, her eyes unfocused.

The Cat began batting a box with his paw. His hissing sounded more curious than angry now.

Tracy shook herself out of her trance after about half a minute. “Anyway!” she said cheerfully. “The Reformation! I believe that’s around here somewhere. Mind the boxes, love.”

By the time Ezra left that night, he’d found the twelve books on the Reformation Aunt Tracy had hidden in her back room and was feeling decidedly better about the whole thing. More importantly, The Cat had decided that the boxes were not his enemies, and were in fact a good place to curl up and sleep.

* * *

The peace was finally, inevitably interrupted as Tracy informed him that she really needed to close the shop now and she was sorry but he’d have to go home.  
The walk home was the same as it was every night. The sun had set a few hours ago, leaving only the glow of fluorescent street lights to light his way home. He dragged his feet, moving as slowly as he could out of the bookshop, past the bakery, past school.  
It was never slow enough, and he was always home far sooner than he wanted to be. 

His key got stuck in the lock, just like it always did, and after a minute or so of fiddling with it, his father opened the door from the inside, like he always did.  
“Hi!” his father welcomed him much too enthusiastically.  
Ezra answered with a small, strained smile. “Hello.”  
Ezra always tried to immediately escape to his room while his father attempted to start a conversation. “How was school today?”  
“Alright.”  
“Anything interesting happen?”  
“No.”  
“Anything interesting happen outside school?”  
“No.”  
His dad sighed, adjusting his glasses. He was going to pull out the ultimate trump card, Ezra just knew it. He always did this, and it just wasn’t fair. Using your knowledge of your son’s likes and dislikes and needs and loves to manipulate him into sitting and talking to you was just below the belt.  
“Have you eaten?”  
He hadn’t. Not since just after school. It had been _hours._ “No.”  
His father smiled again. “Good thing I saved you some food. Come on.”

They repeated the same routine they did every night. Ezra would eat while his father sat across the table, babbling about his day or something he’d seen on telly or something Gabriel had told him or some other inane, boring thing that Ezra absolutely didn’t want to talk about.  
Ezra would pretend to listen, half-heartedly answering his father’s attempts to get him involved in the conversation, or otherwise just ignoring them.  
Truth be told, he felt a bit guilty. He knew his dad was trying, but it just wasn’t going to work. It was an exercise in futility, one that occurred every night and generated the same results every time. 

In the middle of a sentence in the middle of a no doubt very boring anecdote, Ezra finally got up from the table. “I have studying to do, so...I’m going to go do that.”  
His dad blinks in surprise. “Right. Yes, of course, that’s...your studies are very important.”  
“Yes.”  
His father smiles that same smile. A bit sad, a bit disappointed, yet still full of love. “Good night, then. Love you.”  
Ezra tries to smile back.  
“Night.”

He doesn’t actually do any studying. He never studies at home. His room is too cluttered, the house too claustrophobic, for him to concentrate. Instead, he lies in bed for hours, wide awake, thinking.

Images flash through his mind. A whiteboard filled with sums. His brother’s smirk. His father’s sad smile. Tracy shaking under far too much weight. The memory of how his mother would have immediately rushed in to take the box from her, chastising her for taking on more than she can handle. Anathema’s permanent scowl and Newt’s permanent awkwardness and Sister Nutter’s crazy eyes and Crowley’s eyes catching his from the opposite end of the room. Brown eyes, flecked with gold.

Every night his thoughts ran in circles, and every night he’d spend hours trying to get them to stop. 

It was an exercise in futility, occurring every damn night, generating the same results every damn night.


End file.
